


In Every Heart

by justanotherStonyfan



Series: Random AUs [4]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence - Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Chronic Illness, Chronic Pain, De-Serumed Steve Rogers, Head Injury, Hopeful Ending, Implied Violence, M/M, Multi, Not Canon Compliant, Permanent Injury, Polyamory, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-09-28 00:55:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20417201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanotherStonyfan/pseuds/justanotherStonyfan
Summary: After the events of Civil War, Thaddeus Ross captures Captain America and brings him to the Raft.After Thaddeus Ross captures Captain America, Steve Rogers learns to live alongside the two people who love him most.





	In Every Heart

**Author's Note:**

> _In every heart there is a room_   
_A sanctuary safe and strong_

It's movement in the kitchen that first wakes Bucky. Sam stirs when he moves away but the air is warm tonight and Sam isn't going to miss his warmth.

Bucky pads towards the kitchen – it's an odd habit to break, moving like a ghost. He'd done it for so long, but now he lives alongside two people who don't need him to be nothing, who don't need him to disappear. That's truer now than it ever was. But his footsteps are only loud to Sam's ears, no matter how loud he makes them so, while he knows he's walking loudly enough that he'd be heard in the kitchen by anyone else, he has to take his time and be careful. He doesn't want to startle Steve now.

Steve doesn't sleep well any more. It's hard for him to sleep lying down much of the time, and it's difficult to get a full night if his back is playing up. They made love fairly early in the evening and Bucky shouldn't have let him nap after, but he and Sam had talked it over. For someone who sleeps as little as Steve does now, any sleep is good.

Bucky's a little surprised to find Steve dressed, but that fades after a few moments of deliberation. Steve gets cold, he bruises easily, and he gets comfort by layering clothes these days. He's standing at the counter, feet bare, bundled up in his pajama pants and one of Bucky's tanks, one of Sam's zip-up hoodies over it – what he's doing is obscured by his slight frame, but Bucky suspects it's food, something to drink. Something like that. 

Bucky looks around. Steve can't hear him, so he needs to find something to make a noise with.

He sees a chair, moves it a little, then knocks his hip against the table, then bumps his fist against the refrigerator, each sound louder than the last, like an approach, instead of loud and sharp and sudden. Bucky can see in the last instant that it hasn't worked - Steve turns, frowning, and then his whole body spasms as he catches sight of Bucky, mouth falling open on a gasp as he grasps at the counter top.

Bucky's kind of pleased to see that he was making a sandwich, and that he appeared to be grabbing for the bread knife out of instinct, but he's not pleased at how hard Steve startled. 

“Sorry, sweetheart,” Bucky says, smiling as he spreads the arm he has, holds up his hand. He speaks these days with the kind of smooth drawl that's come back to him, that feels natural. Brooklyn wasn't heard to find inside of him once he knew where to look.

But he was still clearly a shock to Steve. Bucky could look a lot more menacing than he does right now. He's only wearing white shorts and a tank himself, so he doesn't exactly blend into the shadows. His hair, too, is back from his face, to give Steve's astigmatism every chance at recognition, but Bucky is aware that he still cuts an intimidating figure.

“Bu- Buck,” Steve says, still a little breathless as his body relaxes back against the counter, and his voice is raspy from sleep, his hair tousled, his eyes big behind his glasses. “Y'almost ng-gave me a heart-attack.”

Steve is smiling, albeit still a little tightly due to the remaining nerves, but Bucky isn't. That's not as funny as it used to be.

“I'm sorry, sweetheart,” Bucky says again, but Steve gives him a half-shrug that says 'don't be.'

Steve reaches up and pushes the little skin-coloured bud into his ear, which explains why he couldn't hear Bucky. 

“Couldn't sleep,” Bucky tells him, and Steve smiles sadly, looks down at his hands – he always had big hands. 

“I'm s- I'm sorry I w-woke you,” he says, because they have always, always read each other like well-loved paperbacks.

Never mind the dog-eared corners, the bent spine, the missing pages or the cracks on the cover. They still fit in each others' hands as easily as they ever did.

~

_History repeats itself, of course it does. Because people never learn. Because people don't heed warnings or lead by example – people are selfish, scared animals. _

_When you're in the same situation all the time, there are only so many ways it can go. And, if you're the type of person to put yourself in the same situation all the time, things can only go your way for so long._

_So, when Rogers and his friends have shown up to help the Avengers, for the umpteenth time, Ross' plan is put into action. Ross doesn't publicize that they've got Captain America, because he'd have to disclose how he'd found him, and half of the general public are still in support of his ideals. _

_But the fact of the matter is, Steve Rogers is captured and, this time, security's high enough that there's nothing even the Winter Soldier can do._

~

Bucky reaches out to him, brings him closer and settles his palm against the dip in the center of Steve's chest, feels the hammering against his skin. 

“Steve,” he says softly, “Stevie, sweetheart, you gotta...” he swallows hard.

Steve doesn't seem to be paying as much attention as he could be, one big, trembling, thin-fingered hand curling around Bucky's wrist to keep his hand in place, the other up against Bucky's chest – for warmth or contact or comfort, Bucky doesn't know. Steve seems tired, his eyes half closed, staring at Bucky's chin, and then collar bones, instead of at his eyes. Bucky strokes softly, curling his stump against Steve's shoulder as he smooths his palm over Steve's chest, down his ribs. He can feel the ridges, but they're exactly the way he remembers anyhow.

“You takin' those pills, huh?” Bucky murmurs.

Steve smiles tiredly.

“I'm ta- takin' those- _hah_\- pills, Buck,” he says, swaying toward Bucky a little. 

Bucky kisses him because he wants to and because there's no reason not to, swaying Steve back again, pressing him up against the counter with a force that's carefully calculated not to hurt him, and Steve is pliant in a way he only ever is for Bucky.

Bucky's hand slides around Steve's waist, he tucks his stump up under Steve's underarm, and he'd lift Steve onto the counter if he could. Steve just raises his arms and slides his palms over Bucky's throat, his shoulders, tugs with shaking fingers at the tie in Bucky's hair until it comes loose and he can plunge his fingers into the strands.

“Buck,” he says, a murmur, probably just to say it – sometimes that's why Bucky says 'Steve' – and they're so close like this that Bucky can feel Steve breathing, Steve's arms reaching so high to meet him that the sleeves are beginning to slide up Steve's forearms, to bunch up at Steve's shoulders, the tank hanging loose on his body so that the hem is below his sharp little collar bones.

He is, in all the ways he has always hated, so very fragile. Even with the metal arm gone, Bucky could so easily hurt him.

They stand there in quiet limbo for a few moments, Steve's body straining up to Bucky's, Steve's face big on his head in a way Bucky never really noticed before. It's Steve who breaks the embrace, who draws his hands back and steps away, and Bucky knows it's because he hesitated.

“Come back to bed,” he says. “Come to bed with us.”

Steve just smiles tiredly, shakes his head as he turns away. 

“I'm huh-aaaving a sandwich, Buck,” he says, the vowel elongated, and then he frowns. “I need s-something in my s-stomach.”

And Bucky knows what this means. It means Steve is taking his stronger painkillers tonight. 

~

_For a long time, Rogers doesn't speak. He stands in silence in the cell that was made for him and stares straight ahead. He doesn't sit. He doesn't sleep._

_Rogers could break out if he wanted to, there's no real doubt about it. But he won't. He's never fought them – Ross told him as they led him from the prisoner transport on arrival that they'd keep him here instead of trying to locate the Winter Soldier. _

_When Ross questions him, he answers with his name, with his rank, with his serial number._

_“You're no longer a Captain,” Ross tells him._

_It makes no difference to the information Rogers recites._

_“We don't have to waste our time like this,” Ross says._

_It makes no difference to the information._

_“You're a vigilante,” Ross sneers._

_It makes no difference._

_“You are here because it's the safest thing for everyone involved.” _

_There's no mention of his lack of fair trial because there's no point. Barnes didn't get one. Banner didn't get one. Rogers won't get one. _

_“You had your chance to comply, to work with us instead of against us. You're here because it's where you need to be. You are a loose canon, driven by Hydra's assassin, and I will do anything to protect people from the people who will hurt them.”_

_Ross is almost at the door when Rogers speaks._

_“Like you protected your daughter?” he says._

_Ross pauses._

_Ross leaves._

~

“How bad is it?” Bucky says softly, sliding his arm around Steve's waist, under the cotton so that he can feel skin.

Steve rolls one shoulder in a shrug and takes a bite of his sandwich as Bucky presses his lips to the back of Steve's neck. Steve holds the sandwich with both hands, but crumbs still litter the countertop.

“Not aw- ful,” he says. “I'm okay.”

Bucky trails his kisses up into the soft hair at the nape of Steve's neck, up to the crown of his skull. He uses shampoo that Bucky picks for him and his hair is soft, beginning to lengthen. Bucky finds the smooth patch of scarred skin with his lips the same way he always does anyway, and follows it. Steve doesn't lean into him but doesn't pull away.

“You want company while you eat that thing?”Bucky murmurs against Steve's skull, and Steve nods.

“Yeah,” he sighs, and Bucky lets go of him so they can walk to the couch.

They've had the ridiculous conversations about _how can you love me now_, and there's nobody who can counter that argument quite as well as the world's longest-serving POW and his half-a-metal-arm.

He sits first, and Steve sits stiffly down after him, between Bucky's legs because the couch is huge and Steve is not. He lets Bucky fold him into his half-embrace and hold him close, back to chest. Steve eats because he has to, not because he wants to, so the least Bucky can do now is hold him close.

They've had the _I could have done more to find you, to get you back,_ conversation, too, but Steve's just as good at countering that with a single raised eyebrow and a long, hard stare. History repeats itself, of course it does.

“Do you want the TV on?” Bucky asks. “We can put it on mute.”

“No,” Steve says through his mouthful. “S'ok.”

And so they sit in relative silence while Steve eats. It takes him a little longer now – his jaw tires, his arms grow heavy, his stomach gets full a lot more quickly than Bucky's been used to for so long.

When he's done, he sighs in relief, holds up his plate because he knows Bucky will take it. It all but drops out of his fingers, and Bucky holds him close as best he can once he's set the plate down.

“Do you have your painkillers?” he asks.

Steve shakes his head a little, tipping his head back until it rests against Bucky's collarbone. 

“Ba- _ath_room,” he says. 

They'll get up in a minute.

~

_“You cannot keep him here,” T'Challa says, and Ross doesn't enjoy the fact that the King of Wakanda is no longer on his side. “He is an American citizen, and he has done nothing wrong.”_

_“He ignored the parameters set out by the Sokovia Accords,” Ross answers. “He aided the escape of a wanted man. And Steve Rogers was an American Citizen. Captain America is the property of the US Government.”_

_And really, when it comes down to it, there's the rub._

_They're already doing the research, using information mined from the leak at SHIELD because they still won't call it HYRA, using data held over from the work they were doing to combat the threat of the Winter Soldier. Even then, it's only a matter of time._

~

Bucky fetches the pills along with a glass of water, and Steve's eyes are only half open when he comes back with them, but their focus is not only obvious, it's also unwavering.

“Like what you see?” Bucky asks.

“Mmm,” Steve answers. “Take off the sh- shorts.”

Bucky smiles, pops a couple of the small, coloured things out of their blister pack and holds them out in his palm.

“You take the pills, I'll do the striptease,” he says, and Steve's eyes close slowly, the corner of his mouth curving upward for a moment.

“You're all wet,” he says, but he's smiling nonetheless. “I l-love you.” he says, and he looks so tired, so pale. 

He's worn thin, and Bucky is thankful every day for the wonders of modern medicine and the benevolence and technological genius of the Wakandan people. 

“I love you too, doll, but you gotta take 'em.”

Steve snorts and opens his eyes. They're still big behind his glasses, and Bucky's a little thrown by it.

Steve takes his pills because Bucky helps him sit forward, opens his mouth to show Bucky that they're gone, and Bucky smiles down at him, cradles Steve's face in his palm and runs his thumb over Steve's lower lip.

“You palooka,” Bucky murmurs.

“Huh?” Steve says, squinting, and Bucky swallows hard, fights down the way his face threatens to fall.

Bucky's always been used to this. Steve's always hates it.

“You palooka,” he says again, louder.

“That figures, you fathead,” Steve answers, but he leans forward for the kiss Bucky gives him. “You gonna take off those shorts or were you just yankin' my chain?”

Bucky wrinkles his nose when he smiles, to keep from laughing.

“Nice to hear you're feelin' better,” he says.

Steve raises the same damned eyebrow he's been raising since the age of four, and the corner of his mouth ticks up.

“I'd be better if you-”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bucky laughs, standing up because why not, “rein 'em in, I'm getting to it.”

~

_It's two months before Rogers is escorted to the Raft's medical wing, with the doctor who's preparing the antiserum. _

_Ross tells him he has a choice, and he can see the moment Rogers makes it._

_Steve isn't afraid. He's been given his options. He's apparently only dangerous if he's Captain America. If he does this, Ross will never go after his friends again. For as much as Thaddeus Ross' word is worth._

_“You can't do this to him, it's a death sentence,” Stark says, and Ross looks at him briefly before turning his attention back to the huge one-way mirror they're using to watch Rogers, in his prison blues, get his shot. “You know it and I know it.”_

_Steve's life expectancy before the serum was twenty-five. He was twenty-six when he received it._

_He's thirty one now_

_“So does he,” Ross answers. _

~

Bucky settles over Steve on the couch because there's something about being pinned that always let Steve feel a little better. Bucky's never brought it up because he's not an idiot, he knows Steve would be livid at the suggestion that not being in charge, not being on top or in control, is something he actually wants.

But even though they've both changed so much, even though time has made them different men, they are as they always have been.

~

_Rogers doesn't behave any differently afterward. _

_He keeps his shoulders back and his head high and even the guards glance between them when he's shown to the exercise yard._

_“I'm not afraid,” he says to the man on his right – he doesn't look at him because he'd have to look up now._

_He can feel the guy looking at him, the guy who has a taser and a gun and a full compliment of body armor. Steve has prison blues and disposable slippers, and a sheet of metal between him and several dangerous criminals that he and the Avengers have spent a good long time putting away._

_“This doesn't make you an executioner.”_

_The guy turns away, won't look at him. _

_The buzzer sounds and the door opens, and Rogers, his hands still in cuffs, steps through the door, and finds himself face to face with people he recognizes. Some of them wear collars or bracelets, or specialized garments. They're all neutralized._

_They don't need superhuman abilities to hurt a man like Steve, and the door closes behind him so he's got nowhere to go._

_Steve looks up at them, shoulders still back, head still high as he nods._

_“Fellas.”_

~

Steve has always made beautiful sounds when Bucky touches him, long lashes sweeping down, full lips bitten red. For a while, for Sam, it was different and difficult - Sam had never known him like this. Sam would raise his head when Steve walked into a room only to have to readjust his gaze, would provide the wrong portions and make jokes about size, but he learned. He learned, because he loves Steve, not Captain America. 

But for Bucky, this is familiar, this, _this_ is where he wants to be. His Steve, pale-skinned and brittle-boned, sleeping and waking on a narcotic cocktail, surviving each day because he’s fought to do so. Bucky runs warm fingers up Steve’s flank and tries not to count each rib, and Steve, a pillow beneath the curve in his spine, sighs sweetly and turns his head to bare his throat. 

It knocks his glasses askew, his long-fingered hands curling at Bucky’s hips, and he moans softly as Bucky follows the line of his throat with his lips and tongue. He clutches Bucky closer, his fingers weak, his body barely big enough to accommodate him. He spreads his legs to pull Bucky down but Bucky twists his hips so as not to be too wide for the cradle of Steve’s, keeps his one hand firm against the arm of the couch so as not to put his full weight on Steve.

Steve makes more of those soft little sounds, and presses his body upward though it strains him to do so, and Bucky kisses at all the skin he can reach.

“You wanna do this here?” Bucky says and Steve, who’s gasping at him now (although he gasps a lot more than he used to anyway) makes a small noise of protest.

“Wha-ere else would you su-ggest?” 

Bucky smiles down at him, leans onto his left side and runs his hand over Steve’s bony hip through his pants, catches the hem of Steve’s tank as he slides his hand back up and ducks his head to kiss the pale skin there, instead. 

“Come back to bed with us sweetheart, darling, baby doll-”

“What?” Steve says. “What did you - did you call me baby doll?”

Bucky lifts his head and looks at him.

“Baby doll,” he says, “you dime, you peach-”

Steve squirms, pretends he’s trying to extricate himself from Bucky’s embrace, stretches out, cranes his neck so Bucky can’t reach him.

“Get off,” he says, “sh-shut up, you-” but he’s smiling, there’s color high on his sharp cheekbones, and he laughs breathlessly. “You palooka, you-”

Bucky cranes his neck too, pretends for a moment he can’t reach.

“Get back here you gorgeous creature, come to papa-”

“Oho, God,” Steve says, and then Bucky’s kissing him again, like coming home, snuggling him down to cocoon him in the warmth of his body, “you… tah-twist my arm…”

~

_It is weeks before Ross will speak to T'Challa, and then he does so only on the word of the government._

_Without the serum, Rogers can be incarcerated in a facility more suited to his crimes, T'Challa says. Why keep him on the Raft when he poses no threat? _

_But why should Ross comply?_

_Blackmail, pure and simple. T'Challa can prove that Ross disregarded the intelligence suggesting the existence of other Winter Soldiers. T'Challa can prove that it was Ross' facility that was breached by Zemo, that Zemo set the Winter Soldier free under Ross' nose. T'Challa can prove that the Raft was only recently made secure enough to stop escape attempts._

_T'Challa can and will go to press from here to Wakanda and tell them of the spectacular failings involving the containment of the Winter Soldier._

_“You don't even know where he is now,” T'Challa tells him. “He could be in my kingdom at this very moment because you could not keep him in your grasp.”_

_There is a long silence before Ross answers him._

_“What would I want Rogers anyway?”_

~

“Mh, you brought him back?” Sam says, scrubbing his hand over his eyes. “Thought y’all were havin’ a party without me.”

Steve still doesn’t let Bucky carry him unless it’s like this, legs around his waist, arms around his neck while they kiss, Bucky's arm supporting him. The edge of the frame of Steve’s glasses bumps the bridge of Bucky’s nose sometimes but it’s a small price to pay, and Sam pulls back the covers as Bucky puts him down.

“Mm, he_llo_,” Sam says, leaning over him while Bucky gets back into bed.

Steve’s arm comes up around Sam’s shoulders as he laughs softly - Bucky shouldn’t be surprised that it took traumatic injury to convince Steve he could enjoy his bedpartners’ affection without having to be stoic about it. 

Before, even before the war, Bucky had to toe the line between affection and what Steve would perceive as pity, or acquiescence. Their love life was a series of “I-can-take-it”s and “you-won’t-break-me”s compounded further every time Bucky denied it. 

Now, now he carries Steve to bed and Sam distracts him with touches while they sort themselves out, and Steve smiles and sighs and clings and kisses. They’re not gentle with him, Bucky supposes, not really. Steve is customary about it sometimes - _“come on, B-Buck, I’m n-not made of glass,”_ \- but mostly he’s like this.

He’s been so hurt, he has been so tired, and he’s still irate at times, still paces and shouts, gets het up about things he wishes he could change. 

He hates not carrying the shield, but Sam and Bucky are good enough for him, Sam and Bucky are righteous enough in his stead. It’s been a tough legacy to live up to (which Steve always dismisses, always insists is an overstatement) but it means that it’s not unbearable. Steve may not like it, it’s not ideal, but he can live with it. 

He lets himself now, where he used to fight and struggle and insist, sink into the couch cushions or their mattress, or be folded into loving arms and covered from both sides with warmth and love.

“Me sandwich,” he says, his low voice a little rough, but Sam says,

“Delicious,” as he nibbles at Steve’s collarbone, sliding his hand under Steve’s shirt.

“Delectable,” Bucky agrees, doing the same so that they can both touch him, so that Steve whines and gasps, hunching his shoulders as sensation takes over, his smile still wide and bright as it ever was. 

His glasses are practically off his face at this point, and Bucky holds his hand in front of Steve’s face.

“Lemme get those for you,” he says, because they won’t make love again tonight, they were lucky to have had what they had, but canoodling until they fall asleep will be more comfortable for all of them without his eyewear. “and your ear. My nightstand,” he says.

“Hmm,” Steve answers, and kisses him proper then, breaks away to get one from Sam, too. 

“You a’right?” Sam says. “You still got all them legs-”

“Not sure,” Bucky answers, and Steve rolls his eyes, pushes as Sam’s face with his hand but Sam’s back a moment later, pulling at Steve’s pants. 

Sam’s already naked too, of course, and Bucky distracts Steve’s upper half while Sam’s taking care of the lower.

Once Sam’s gotten the pajamas off Steve’s legs, Bucky pulls Steve toward himself, makes it easier for Sam to get his hands inside Steve’s shirt, and Steve moans softly, smiles, shudders a little.

His hand quakes but Bucky can hold him up, and Steve's eyes are unfocused but clear when they take the rest of his clothes.

“Don’t get cold,” Bucky tells him, and then rolls them back, watches Sam cover Steve’s body with his own - hips twisted, hand braced, just like Bucky’s were.

~

_“We can provide the best care for you,” T'Challa tells him. _

_“Muh- M-My...” he struggles with the word, leans forward – Bucky can see him try to force it past his lips as his eyelids flutter. “Huh- My head?”_

_T'Challa doesn't answer for a long few moments and Steve, small though he is, seems to shrink._

_“We can help you,” T'Challa answers. “Just as we helped...Sergeant Barnes.”_

_He always stumbles over what to call Bucky. Someday he'll get T'Challa to say 'Bucky' like everyone else._

_“N-No c-cure, huh?” Steve says, and he sounds cold, tired, words broken up like a bad connection._

_“We will give you the best care we can offer,” T'Challa answers, truthfully. “Improvement, at the very least.”_

_There's only so much to be done for brain damage._

_“Wh- -y?” Steve asks, and T'Challa rests one hand on his forearm._

_“Because I learned in Siberia,” he says, “the information that stopped me becoming the murderer I had thought your friend to be.”_

_Bucky says nothing. Bucky still sees himself as a murderer._

_Steve, in a move that Bucky finds terrifyingly uncharacteristic, does not argue._

_“Tha- ah -ank you,” he says instead._

~

Steve doesn’t take long to fall asleep. He won’t sleep for long - perhaps until he needs more painkillers, or maybe until he’s too cold or uncomfortable - but having him pressed up to both of them, being tangled with him in their bed, Bucky wouldn’t trade it, not for anything, anything at all.

“You want his other ear?” Sam says, low, because Steve left his other hearing aid on Sam’s side when they fell asleep this evening. 

“Nah,” Bucky says, stroking Steve’s hair back off his forehead. 

It’s thin and wispy now, like it was before, not the full, thick strands that used to get in Captain America’s eyes. Sam’s fingers do the same for Bucky before he rests his hand in the middle of Steve’s back, and he winds his legs with Bucky’s because Steve’s legs are shorter. 

“He okay?” Sam says, and Bucky sighs heavily.

“Stronger painkillers,” he says - they won’t wake him now, not without his hearing aids. “He was having somethin’ to line his stomach.”

“Mmh,” Sam says, and his hand shifts again, finds Bucky’s and lifts it to his lips before he puts it back and settles down again. “I’ll make waffles in the morning,” he says. “Love the both of you.”

“Mmh,” Bucky says, almost asleep under the slight weight of his whole world. “Us too.”

**Author's Note:**

> _And so it goes, and so it goes,_   
_And you're the only one who knows._


End file.
